About:
If there's one thing I love about designing layouts for my blog, it would have to be the freedom that goes with it. What I mean is, I'm free to design something that appeals to me...not necessarily what someone else is looking for. It doesn't have to be widely compatible with other browsers. If I know how it works and it looks good for me, then I'm more than happy with it!

The idea for this layout came out of nowhere. I didn't see someone else use it...I just wanted to create something with a computer-like interface. Sort of futuristic too. This is where the freedom I was talking about came in. I'm usually hesitant to design a lot of things from scratch, worried that it may not be "cool" looking to other visitors, but my blog is special and in a way a testing ground for new ideas. So I set to work designing an interface that looked good and this is what came of it! I really think it looks good ^^ And for some reason I'm really bent on black backgrounds in a lot of my layouts...

This is the first time I used a style other than the traditional two-column blog template for this site. That in itself worried me a little because I was going away from something I felt comfortable developing. But surprisingly, I like this way better because I'm able to fit more content in, it's easy to read and navigate, and it just looks more creative with less cliché thrown in ^^;;

Making all the elements come together was so much fun too! I don't create pure table layouts as much as I used to and I almost forgot how much fun they are to tweak!! Am I just being a geek? Hehe...Oh well. Getting the counter, guestbook, imood, and next destination elements to be in the perfect place was challenging but so much fun in the end. And it looks flawless too. Always a plus!

Several new things I tried in this version: transparent scrollbars, an image map guestbook, and a javascript popup window! The scrollbars are cool because I set the entire default one transparent and positioned it over the two pairs of arrows which are actually just part of the background image. But when you click on them, the invisible scrollbars are still there and scroll up or down respectively. I know there's a way to do this with Javascript and believe me, I would have used that way if it were any other site of mine. But like I said before, part of the fun of my blog is using it as a testing ground ^_^

One thing about the guestbook that really stands out is that it's an animated gif image map. Phew, long name! There's a little spacer that blinks on and off, not annoying at all, which makes it look like a cursor. This adds to the futuristic-computer-layout effect. Hehe...it also servers to get your attention ever so slightly so that visitors will visit my guestbook and sign it! WAI!! I need more feedback!

Now about the Javascript popup window...It's hard to see in the screen cap above, but there is a link to a list of all my fanlistings. When clicked…it loads a new window with all my fanlisting buttons in it. The window can't be resized and there are no menu options. It's just a window. Behold the power of Javascript!!

There really isn't anything I dislike about it. It's different, original, fun to make...I'm just going to have to stay away from dark backgrounds next time^_^;;